


I Shouldn't Have Loved You

by Libelli



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Cuddling & Snuggling, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-16
Updated: 2020-09-16
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:20:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26502016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Libelli/pseuds/Libelli
Summary: After leading the Almyrans to aid a United Fodlan, Claude has some thoughts after seeing Byleth after so long.
Relationships: My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 5
Kudos: 81





	I Shouldn't Have Loved You

**Author's Note:**

> I was annoyed with Claude's S Support and how Byleth was just like 'Okay,' when he confessed to her, and then he leaves only to come back years later.   
> Now this exists.

The sun was just starting to rise above the horizon. Morning pink light filtered in through the sheer curtains. The air carried the songs of birds and the promise of a warm summer day. 

Claude felt awful. 

Byleth still lay sleeping, she was curled on her side, her green hair spilling back, barely grazing Claude’s face as he laid beside her. Claude had tried to sleep, he had; he thought it had been the adrenaline of the battle not fading away. Byleth had stayed up with him, whispering with him even though they were the only two in the room, holding him as close as he held her. Nothing had worked and Claude eventually pretended to sleep for her sake. 

He watched the moon arc across the sky, glowing softly behind gauzy clouds, casting only enough light to illuminate the room. Claude laid beside Byleth, listening to every sound in the castle and in the grounds below. He listened to her breathing, every time her breath hitched or fell out of rhythm, Claude came to alert, going through the checklist of every poison gas she could have breathed in the battle and every toxin that could have coated a blade. But she would always start breathing normally again, and Claude would go back to counting footsteps. 

Byleth stirred next to Claude, she drew the blankets in closer, and her eyes twitched like they wanted to open. Claude propped himself up on his elbows. 

“ _ By _ ?” Her name hung in the air. Claude dared to lean closer, his face inches from her ear. “ _ By _ ,” he whispered. 

Byleth made an annoyed noise and turned her head away from Claude. So, she wasn’t really awake. Claude wished he was sleeping with her. His head buzzed and his eyes stung from the diligent watch he had kept all night. It had not been because of the adrenaline. It had been because of Byleth. 

This was the first time he had seen her in years,  _ really _ seen her. In the three years since ending the war in Fódlan, Claude had climbed his way to the throne of Almyra, while Byleth had ruled over the newly united Fódlan. 

They sent each other letters, talking strategy and other important intelligence that Claude could have used as bargaining chips in his own nearly mutinous court. Instead, Claude found himself smiling looking at her loopy handwriting and holding the letter to his nose to breath in the smells of Deridru- or wherever it was Byleth had taken up residence at the time. 

They met a few times- always for only a few days at a time (at most) and usually in some secret rendezvous organized by Hilda at the Locket. Their meetings always started off as formal and tactical, and then something more, something neither of them could even predict. Then, one or both of them would have to leave and return to their thrones alone.

“Wait,” Byleth had said once, grabbing onto his sleeve. Claude had stepped off of his wyvern’s stirrup and stood in front of Byleth. She reached up and placed a silver ring in his shirt pocket. “For the one you gave me.” she said simply, like it was the most basic fact in the world. 

Claude pulled Byleth close and kissed her brow. He rested his head against hers. “You didn’t have to.” 

“I wanted to,” Byleth said, then she added, “You said you loved me.” 

Then the letters had started getting worse, until a quickly scrawled note came on the wings of an exhausted pegasus and its master: the remnants of the Empire and Those Who Sliter in the Dark were mounting a revolt. 

Every clever calculation in Claude’s head crumbled to dust. 

He had never rode his wyvern or pushed his troops harder. 

Claude had flown over the battlefield, his Golden Deer friends had been called to the battle as well, and they were on their last legs. Their queen and professor stood in the front, holding the line. There was a moment when the two armies froze and then Claude had declared the Almyrans as allies of the United Fódlan. Byleth looked up at him like he had looked at her so many times before. Then she rallied her troops and they won the day.

Claude gazed down at Byleth below him. Half-healed scratches and magic burns were scattered on her face, arms, and hands. They were wounds he hardly noticed the night before when Byleth had asked him to join her in her room, but now in the light they were unmistakable. There was a particular dark burn on her left hand, Marianne had said that she had done all she could and it would just need time. 

Claude looked at his own hands, they were relatively unchanged from even three years ago, except the silver ring he didn’t remove from his ring finger. The ring Claude thought had matched Byleth’s eyes sat on her bedside table. 

She had waited for him at the battle. Waiting on a desperate note that might not even have made it through Almyra’s airspace, let alone into the hands of a busy king in time. Waiting on an old ally she had collectively seen for a fortnight in three years. 

She was still waiting for him. 

What had that gotten her? Ramshackled rendezvous, battle wounds, and  _ Claude _ .

Three years and the queen of an unstable nation still had not married an advantageous ally or secured the succession. She kept the ring given to her by a foreign prince who had offered nothing. She had kept the ring of a man who left her. She had kept the ring of a smitten boy who wanted more than he could ever hold.

Byleth shifted again, now turning to face Claude. He leaned down and pressed a kiss to a magic burn on her arm. It was all he could do. He raised himself up only for a moment, until he saw a gash near the burn. He leaned back down. Another soft kiss. Then another, a little more persistent. And another. 

The scabs scratched his lips, and the burns were hot beneath his touch, and still Claude kept kissing every inch of exposed skin he could. 

_ I shouldn’t have loved you _ . Claude thought as he kissed her on her neck, her shoulder. 

He knew he was the only one who could kiss her like this. She was the only one he would kiss like this. She was his. 

She was his to call into battle, to lead a war; his to put in charge a volatile nation. 

And he was completely and utterly hers.  _ I shouldn’t love you.  _

Byleth stirred. “ _ Hey _ .” she murmured. She blinked awake and took in what was happening, then she pulled Claude close to her and kissed his temple. “Good morning.” 

“ _ Morning _ ,” Claude kissed her lips. 

Byleth looked out the window at the rising sun. Claude’s gaze followed hers. They sat in silence, Byleth propped up against Claude’s chest, his arms around her. 

“It’s a new day,” Byleth said. “Nothing happened in the night.”

Claude spoke so as not to disturb the morning. “Do you think this will be the day generations look back and say this was the beginning of the unification of Fódlan and Almyra?” he asked. 

Byleth shrugged. “It could be.” 

“I could marry you,” the words came out before Claude even thought them over. 

Byleth sat up slowly. “ _ Claude… _ ” she looked down at the sheets. 

Claude reached for her hand. “I still love you,” he said. “ _ I always have _ .”

“Do you have a plan this time?” Byleth asked.

“No.” Claude laughed. 

Byleth smiled. She leaned back into Claude and slung her arm around his middle. Claude’s hand was still holding hers and she pulled it close and pressed a kiss to it. 


End file.
